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Editor's note
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Back in 1979, as a spotty 17-year-old struggling to make sense of the world, but excited by the prospect of leaving home for the adventure of university, I can remember the impact of a Manchester band called Joy Division, whose strangely charismatic lead singer Ian Curtis was to take his own life the following year, just as he and his comrades were on the brink of fame and fortune. The band’s debut album, Unknown Pleasures, was in all my friends’ record collections that first year and we all had t-shirts featuring that weird album cover with all those squiggly lines.
We all had our theories about that those squiggly lines represented (a graphic representation of the female orgasm was one theory, but of course at that age I knew nothing of that). Forty years on, I’m amazed to read that the lines represent a recording of the signal emitted by a pulsar in space. A team of astrophysicists from the University of Manchester has taken recordings from the same pulsar with a radio telescope at Jodrell Bank, which
is only 14 miles from where Joy Division recorded their album.
Forty years on we now know much more about what those wiggly lines mean, but there have been few better debut albums than the one whose cover they adorned and it’s been a real pleasure to revisit that album, for which I owe those astrophysicists in Manchester a heartfelt vote of thanks.
This week, we’ve been watching a lot of tennis, marvelling at a 210,000 year-old human skull and wondering what’s next for British diplomacy after the Darroch affair. From our global network, here’s a piece about how artificial intelligence could help make fishing more sustainable, and how Muslim women in New
Zealand mix faith with fashion.
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Jonathan Este
Associate Editor, Arts + Culture Editor
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‘Unknown Pleasures’ as you’ve never seen it before…
Freeda/Shutterstock
Patrick Weltevrede, University of Manchester
When you look at the squiggly lines on Joy Division's famous album cover, you're seeing a record of lightning in outer space.
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Nicolas Primola/Shutterstock
Anthony Sinclair, University of Liverpool
New research suggests humans spread to Europe at least 50,000 years earlier than previously thought.
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Kim Darroch: not in Trump’s good books.
Niall Carson/PA Wire
Dan Lomas, University of Salford
The leak of US dipomatic cables by Wikileaks revealed some equally frank assessments of British politicians.
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Don’t call it a comeback.
Aero Icarus/Wikimedia Commons
Iain Boyd, University of Michigan
Recent advances in technology and new trends in commercial air travel could make supersonic flight economically viable. But regulations will have to change first.
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A fisherman carries a yellowfin tuna to be weighed and sold in Mindanao, Philippines in 2013.
John Javellana / Greenpeace
Melina Kourantidou, Dalhousie University
Earth-orbiting satellites and AI tools can track fishing vessels around the world.
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Muslim women wear the hijab as a statement of fashion and identity.
from www.shutterstock.com
Anoosh Soltani, University of Waikato; Hannah Thinyane, United Nations University
Muslim women are often perceived as oppressed and self-segregated, but many contemporary Muslim women reinterpret Islam to express their sense of style and fashion.
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Joanne Demmler, Swansea University; Sinead Brophy, Swansea University
New research has found several physical and mental health indicators that often appear before an eating disorder diagnosis.
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Melina Malli, University of Kent; Rachel Forrester-Jones, University of Bath
Singer Bilie Eilish has spoken about her Tourette's. We need more people like her to speak out.
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John William Devine, Swansea University
Australia's aggressive tennis star has been unfairly maligned in this instance.
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Jolanta Burke, University of East London
Research has found that students suffer lower levels of well-being when they don't regularly use their greatest strengths of character.
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Milena Buchs, University of Leeds
Universities play a significant role in the high and rising air travel footprint – and they need to do more about it.
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Featured events
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99 George St , Glasgow, Glasgow City, G11RD, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland — University of Strathclyde
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King's Manor, York, York, YO1 7EP, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland — University of York
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The Forum, Streatham Campus, Exeter, Devon, EX4 4QJ, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland — University of Exeter
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University of Essex, Wivenhoe Park, Colchester, Essex, CO4 3SQ, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland — University of Essex
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